


The Look Part 4

by jupiter23



Series: The Look [4]
Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: F/M, M/M, culmination of said revelations, flagrant use of an inside joke, revelations when it comes to feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 12:51:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19377076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jupiter23/pseuds/jupiter23
Summary: Scott comes to a realization.





	The Look Part 4

Scott smiled as he watched the scenery fly by on the other side of the Nomad’s windows. It was actually happening, he was actually out on a mission! Though he wasn’t sure _how_ , exactly, Sara was going to get this remnant tiller working, but he’d worry about the details when they got there. The only thing he cared about right now was that his mood was gradually improving the further away from the _Tempest_ they got. Not even the fact that he lost all that money to Gil was getting to him right now.

Speaking of, he wondered what Gil thought of H-047c. Scott himself thought it was quite beautiful, as long as you could ignore the fact that it was deadly as hell. It reminded him of the surface of Earth’s Moon. Complete with the low gravity, he noted, as he felt the Nomad’s wheels leave the surface yet again.

“Someone’s in a good mood,” Sara commented when the Nomad touched down again.

“I told you he’d feel better as soon as he got to go shoot something,” Drack said.

“It isn’t that so much as it is finally getting to _do_ something,” Scott said. “Seriously, I owe you so much for getting me out here.”

“You don’t owe me anything, as I’ve already said,” Sara said. “We both came out here to explore, not sit on our asses.”

“Yeah, but I still intend to pay you back somehow,” Scott insisted.

“Are you gonna do that before or after you pay Brodie back?” Drack asked.

“What does Gil have to do with anything?” Scott shot back.

“I’m just saying. First you owe your sister, and now you’re indebted to your boyfriend…”

“Uh, Gil is _not_ my boyfriend. And I don’t owe Sara money,” Scott retorted. “Besides, _you_ probably owe Gil more money than I do.”

“Hey, I’m going to win all of that money back, just watch me. And with the way you two have been looking at each other, I’m surprised you haven’t started fucking like pyjaks by now. Isn’t that how humans court each other?”

“No! And I have _not_ been looking at Gil like I want to fuck him! And what is so funny?” Scott’s indignation had turned to Sara, who had started snickering as he spoke.

“You are,” she answered. “There is definitely something going on between the two of you.”

“I think you two should have your eyes checked,” Scott muttered. He was glad he had his helmet on, because he could feel his face flushing.

“Our eyes are just fine,” Sara said.

“You’re the one that needs to get your eyes checked if you can’t tell what’s going on,” Drack added.

“There is _nothing_ going on, old man,” Scott growled.

“Yeah, and Tann and I are best friends,” Drack retorted.

“The point is,” Sara cut in before the argument could go any further, “that we’re all happy for the two of you.”

“If you say so,” Drack said. “I just wish they’d get it over with.”

Before Scott could make another retort, his omni-tool chimed with an incoming email. He thought about ignoring it, until he saw who it was from.

_Scott,_

_I’m not going to take your money. Not this time, anyway. (Don’t tell anyone, especially Drack. I can’t have them all thinking I’m a nice person when it comes to cards. Especially Drack.)_

_\--Gil_

“Huh,” he murmured.

“What is it?” Sara asked.

“Nothing,” Scott said. “Nothing at all.”

“Didn’t sound like ‘nothing,’” Drack said. “But if it was about an asari matriarch, just know that it’s a scam.”

“Drack, _everyone_ knows about the ‘asari matriarch’ scam,” Scott said.

“Oh, uh…right…just making sure you knew too…”

Was it Scott’s imagination, or did Drack sound flustered? Going by Sara’s sudden uncontrollable giggling, he guessed it wasn’t. He decided not to push the issue. He didn’t want it somehow turning back on to the subject of himself and Gil.

But he was still left with the question of why Gil changed his mind about taking his money.

 

A few hours later saw the successful completion of their mission, but brought Scott no closer to an answer. He’d even emailed Gil back asking why he’d changed his mind, but he had yet to get a response. He was starting to wonder if Gil had even seen his email. He could ask SAM, but then of course Sara and Drack would know something was up and then Sara would start grilling him and wouldn’t stop until she had an answer, which meant Drack would find out what Gil had done and that was the opposite of what Gil wanted.

Though, to be fair, maybe Gil had just gotten busy with something else and had simply not checked his email.

Or maybe he was being cryptic on purpose.

Okay, so it was starting to drive Scott crazy.

…Why was it driving him crazy? Gil was a busy person; he’d get around to reading his email when he had the time. And Scott was a grown man, damn it. He needed to stop acting like a school boy with a…

…with a…

…well…shit…

…with a _crush_ …

He was suddenly glad Drack had decided to take a nap on the way back and that Sara was concentrating on driving. He didn’t know what he would do if either of them had noticed him having his sudden revelation.

Before he could begin fully processing this new piece of information, however, his omni-tool pinged with a new email. But his excitement that it might be Gil lasted until he saw the name of the sender.

_Ryder,_

_Well, I tried. We all did, really. And by “all,” I mean ALL of us. Literally. Even Kallo tried to talk Gil into giving you some of your money back. He just isn’t budging. Our last two resorts are now on their way back to the_ Tempest _with you. And if they can’t make Gil change his mind, then short of breaking our fake radio silence to call Jill, I don’t think anyone can._

_If you need to borrow any credits in the meantime, just let one of us know._

_I’m sorry,_

_\--Vetra_

Scott was proud of himself for the fact that he’d managed to not laugh at Vetra’s email. He was really touched that everyone was willing to argue on his behalf, but it was unnecessary, and they didn’t even realize it. He tapped off a quick email back to her reassuring her that it really was fine, he’d be okay until their next payday.

Then he thought about trying to email Gil again, but decided against it. He’d ask him in person just how much fun he was having bullshitting everyone, and they could laugh about it together. And the best part of _that_ would be that Scott would get to see that gorgeous smile that made his heart flutter in person. 

Damn. That smile had been doing that to him since the first time he’d ever seen it, hadn’t it?

Then there had been that morning a few days ago when he’d woken up in Gil’s arms and neither one of them had spoken of since. He still didn’t know why he’d wanted Gil to stay with him—honestly, it hadn’t been the first time he’d had those nightmares, and he should have been able to deal with it just like he had all the other times—but he really hadn’t wanted to be alone. And if he was going to ask anyone to stay with him, well, he was glad Gil had been there, and not just because he smelled so nice, and…

…and…

...fuck, this was way deeper than a crush, wasn’t it?

 

Gil gave a brief glance up as the doors to engineering sealed themselves behind Liam, Jaal, Cora, and PeeBee before turning back to the last of the calculations he was running. The four of them had been working in the cargo bay when SAM announced the Pathfinder’s return to the ship, which meant the cargo bay needed to be depressurized in order to bring the Nomad back aboard, which meant Gil usually wound up with a few visitors in engineering whenever they had to go through the process. And unless something went wrong, it wasn’t worth his attention.

Except that he was nearly done here, and he was starting to get hungry. Vetra must have made it her personal mission to talk Gil into giving Scott his money back, since she’d managed to recruit everyone else into trying to talk him into the idea as well. He’d only left engineering twice—once to use the bathroom, and once to go to the galley for some water—but both times, he’d been waylaid by someone. He hadn’t been keen to have it happen again, so he’d stayed in engineering. Not that it had stopped anyone from coming down there. It was just easier to make himself look too busy to discuss it while he actually _was_ busy.

But now he was out of things to do, and Sara, Scott and Drack were about to be back on the ship, and he fully expected the pestering to start back up again any second.

Fortunately, no one had spoken to him yet, so as soon as he was finished, he turned to watch as Sara shut down the Nomad while the bay door finished closing behind it. Once the door was secure, Sara, Scott, and Drack climbed out as they all waited for the bay to re-pressurize.

Gil couldn’t help but watch Scott, whose back was to him. It turned out he also couldn’t help making a comment.

“That _is_ the Andromeda Initiative’s ass,” he murmured, a smile pulling at his lips.

He didn’t have to look up to know everyone else was giving him strange looks. Then PeeBee grunted in indignation.

“I thought _I_ had the Andromeda Initiative’s ass,” she said petulantly.

The response had been unexpected enough that Gil momentarily pulled his gaze away from Scott. “Yeah, but I’m not attracted to _your_ ass,” he shot back.

“Scott does have a rather nice ass,” Jaal interjected before anyone else could say anything. “However, I would argue that Sara’s is nicer.”

“Ah, I see! You’re both biased,” PeeBee said. “Liam, Cora, tell them they’re wrong.”

Liam immediately threw his hands up and shook his head. “Uh-uh, not going there,” he said.

“Your ass looks fine, PeeBee,” Cora said non-committally, not even looking in PeeBee’s direction.

PeeBee huffed in annoyance. “Can’t get any appreciation around here…” she muttered.

As PeeBee continued grumbling under her breath, Gil returned his attention to Scott, who was now watching the five of them from the floor of the cargo bay. The bay was still re-pressurizing, so Scott still had his helmet on, which meant all Gil could see of his face were his eyes.

Eyes which somehow still managed to find one another’s and lock together.

How was it that one singular pair of ice blue eyes could be so unreadable and yet say so much at once?

Chief among the things they were saying; _we need to talk._

 

About an hour after returning to the _Tempest_ , having had a shower and dressed in clean clothes, a still-slightly-dazed-from-his-earlier-revelation Scott made his way up to the meeting room.

Oh, he had every intention of finding Gil to get an answer as to why he’d chosen to not take his credits. In fact, right after SAM had given the all-clear for them to leave the cargo bay would have been a good time for Scott to go up to engineering and talk to him. Except Gil hadn’t been alone up there, and while he could have asked to speak to Gil alone and then shut the doors, he didn’t want to take a chance on someone eavesdropping. And for multiple reasons, this was a conversation he didn’t want overheard, or even _potentially_ overheard.

As he reached the meeting room, he could feel the gentle shuddering in the floor plates of the _Tempest_ , signaling that it was preparing to lift off. To where, he didn’t know, since he hadn’t asked Sara where they were headed next. _I suppose I’ll find out soon enough_ , he thought as he approached one of the sets of windows just as the ship left the surface of H-047c’s main asteroid.

Scott didn’t know how long he stood there, though it couldn’t have been very long—they hadn’t even left the Remav system yet—when he heard footsteps approaching from behind him.

“For the record, I did get your email,” Gil said as he joined Scott at the window. “And while I would have happily answered it, do you know how suspicious it would have looked to type an email like that while dodging everyone’s badgering?”

Scott looked over at him, though whether he had been going to answer him or not fled his mind once he’d had his first glimpse of Gil Brodie bathed in starlight. Then an image formed in his mind where Gil wore nothing but starlight, and suddenly that was all he could think about.  
  
“Why?” he asked quietly, and he knew he didn’t need to elaborate further when Gil looked back at him and he couldn’t see a trace of levity anywhere on his face.

“I don’t really know,” Gil said. “I just…couldn’t do it, you know?”

“Yeah, I think I do,” Scott answered breathlessly. “Though I feel like I owe you for that now, though.”

Gil watched him, his face almost as unreadable as it had been during the poker game. “Then you can pay me back for that right now.”

Before Scott could react otherwise (not that he would have,) the two of them were stepping into one another’s personal space, then Gil was cupping his cheeks in both hands, and then their lips met.

 

Sara rubbed at a sore muscle in the back of her neck as she headed up to the meeting room. Among one of her many waiting emails had been one from Evfra requesting her help with something for the resistance on Voeld, and she’d decided that it was worth the risk of the Nexus finding out her exact whereabouts to call the resistance leader for more information. Though she didn’t think it very likely that Evfra would rat her out to Tann; from what she’d heard about the very few interactions between the two, the angaran resistance leader was about as likely to break Tann’s neck as any krogan was at any given moment.

When she reached the meeting room, however, she was brought up short by the sight on the other side of the room.

It took Sara a few seconds to recover from her surprise at the sight of her brother and her technical officer in a tight embrace with their mouths locked together, backlit by the stars outside the ship.

It took her another second to open her omni-tool and snap a picture of the moment, and then she was quietly retreating down the ramp to find Jaal.

The call could wait, she decided.


End file.
